The Pixel Project, which works to prevent violence against women, uses positive imagery rather than the more common shock advertising. Photograph: Sarah Lee for the Guardian

Getting people to support less 'cuddly' causes such as domestic violence, disabled rights or prisoners' rights has always been a Sisyphean task. There is always the lurking temptation for charities working on tough causes to reach for shock advertising to generate awareness and donations. A recent example is Kony 2012 which takes using shock imagery to the next level with a video narrative gone viral on the wave of global online outrage resulting in an outpouring of donations.

Rob Dyson from Whizz Kidz commented in a discussion about whether charities have gone too far in using shock advertising: "As long as these ads still appear to work, charities will keep using them. People give because of tragedy and sadness. It's our challenge to prevent our users and clients being turned into a circus of sadness." Yet a case can be made for the diminishing returns of shock imagery as illustrated by aid agencies campaigning for donations by bombarding the public with pictures of starving people in Africa. They wildly succeeded in the mid-1980s and the funds poured in. However, when the tactics were repeated in the early 1990s, their efforts fell flat in the face of compassion fatigue from previously enthusiastic donors.

There are always powerful alternatives to negative campaigning. As charities, we have to get creative about reaching people and giving them the tools to get involved. Done right, positive campaigns build goodwill, generate conversation and galvanise the layperson to take action. The It Gets Better Project founded by American columnist Dan Savage to prevent suicides by LGBT teenagers went viral as LGBT adults from around the world sent YouTube messages of hope to LGBT teenagers. There was no advertising spend, no distressing imagery, no guilt-tripping – just word-of-mouth and a platform anybody can use to participate in the cause.

The charity I founded, The Pixel Project, works to prevent and stop violence against women. Right from the start, we stuck to using positive images, ideas and strategies to power our campaigns and empower survivors and supporters to take action. From music to photography to cupcakes, our campaigns make people smile while mobilising musicians, photographers and independent businesses to spread awareness in their communities and raise funds for the cause. One of our volunteers, Gia Ibarra, described our approach best when she said: "As a survivor of rape and domestic violence working to heal and help other survivors, I feel at home with The Pixel Project who showed me that activism can be fun and that you can help the cause without using or being exposed to the triggering images or videos that many anti-violence against women organisations use to raise awareness."

As charities who frequently deal with sensitive, even controversial, issues, we owe it to those we serve to avoid sensationalising their pain. Bad enough that they had to face trauma and obstacles without us using them or their situation as case studies to leverage public guilt. We need to ask ourselves: Are we fighting for brand recognition or are we fighting for real change? If all shock advertising does is generate temporary public outrage, reinforce negative perceptions of our causes and create compassion fatigue, then we should abandon it.

Here are a couple of best practices for building successful positive campaigns:

The Power of Positive Appeal

Instead of using shock advertising to provoke negative emotions such as outrage and anger in an attempt to motivate the public to donate and get involved, why not create campaigns that spark positive emotions in people such as hope, compassion and generosity? Even a subtle shift to affirming the positive can have a powerful effect on donors. The UK's Prostrate Cancer Charity discovered this when they held an initiative to gauge the reaction of donors to negative and positive appeal letters. Donors who received the positive appeal letters made donations worth 45 percent more on average.

Find the Bright Spots

Try what Jerry Sternin did when he was asked to open Save The Children's Vietnam office in 1990 with meagre resources and a charge to fight child malnutrition within 6 months. His strategy was to observe mothers with young children in a village to locate what Chip and Dan Heath, the authors of Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard call "bright spots" which are essentially effective efforts worth emulating. He noted what mothers with healthier children were doing right and got them to teach other mothers to do the same thing. 6 months later, 65 percent of the children in the area were visibly better nourished and remained so.3 So look for 'bright spots' already happening in your community – find out what is getting supporters actively engaged with the cause that you serve. Then, build your campaign around that.

We have a responsibility to break the 'circus of sadness' and start focusing on how we and our supporters can move forward together to build a better future for those we help. After all, when we signed up to join the charity sector, we signed up to change the world.

Regina Yau is Founder and President of The Pixel Project, a complete virtual, volunteer-led global nonprofit organisation whose mission is to raise awareness, funds and volunteer power for the cause to end violence against women.